Took my sister and girlfriend to Cabrillo Mole in Avalon.
We took the 7:05AM ferry out of Long Beach and fished from about 8:30AM to 5:30PM and tool the 6:30PM ferry back.
When we first got there the bonito were running and a guy was reeling them in one after the other with a colt sniper style stick bait. He caught six in 10 minutes and told me he had caught about 50 since he had been fishing. Seemed like an over estimate to me but that's what he said and given that he was not stopping to keep fish or take pictures, it was definitely possible given the amount that we actually saw him catch. I quickly rigged up my sister with a colt sniper but I could tell by the pace of her retrieve and the length of her casts that it would be difficult for her to hook up. Her retrieve was too slow and casts were too short. The guy catching them was casting far and doing a quick retrieve that kept the lure near the surface. By the time I rigged up the rest of the poles, the bonito were gone and the three of us don't have high confidence fishing lures so we rigged up for bottom fishing.
Once I got the bottom rigs setup, all three of us started catching fish. My girlfriend caught the first fish and it was an impressive double up of a 14.5" sheephead and a garibaldi. We quickly returned the garibaldi and dispatched the sheephead. My forgetfulness almost compromised our trip. I had a box of 2 ounce bank sinkers that I forgot to pack so between the 3 of us we only had 9 sinkers. Fortunately, I walked to the Pleasure Pier in the harbor and found a tackle shop there that had the sinkers we needed. Bottom fishing the Mole with three of us being relatively inexperienced anglers meant that we were going to lose some tackle. This was a much more challenging day with kelp snags than our previous trip. All three of us lost fish that went into the kelp.
It was a tricky day for me cause I found it difficult finding my rhythm. I was spending so much time deckhanding (dehooking fish, unsnagging and retying rigs, and dispatching fish) that I felt like my line was not in the water very much. Just as I found a nice rhythm, it was time to start packing up. I'm trying to decide if stopping to clean fish is a good decision or if I should wait to clean fish when I get home. I'm leaning toward cleaning fish there. I'm just not setup well to clean fish at home and the fishing day is long enough that I don't mind taking 30 minutes of so to clean the fish. Also I can't imagine getting home at 8:30PM and taking another hour to clean fish (slower because of the poor setup). There is an unused boat ramp just to right of the Mole and you have easy access to sea water and when the tide comes up it will wash the scales off the ramp.
The bite was a level slower than the previous two trips but still excellent compared to anything available on shore anywhere else. The dominant species was again California Sheephead, followed very closely by Ocean White Fish. Every type of fish my sister caught was a new species for her (calico bass from shore, rock wrasse, senorita, blacksmith, blue perch, sheephead and ocean white fish). Those were the species that all three of us caught during the day. I'll update our total fish counts as soon as I have a chance to tally them.
Everytime we've been previously, we've shared the pier with groups of Korean anglers fishing very long light poles with floats for mainly opal eye. This is the first time we saw one of those groups have a noteable day of fishing. They seemed to with semi-regularity haul in very large opal eye that I estimate was were in the 14-16" range. They also were catching good amounts of blue perch and a few calico bass. My girlfriend and sister took turns fishing our own float rig but they again only caught black smith and blue perch.
The only nuance to our fishing that we noticed were that the ocean white fish did not start biting until late afternoon. Then we caught them as the dominant species until we left. The rising tide may have been a factor or they may be a species that bites closer to dusk. I remember this being the case last time to.
We ended up keeping 5 Sheephead, 8 Ocean White fish and 1 rock wrasse.
Great day! I think I will go back this Sunday on my own. I'll update the post later with more pictures and final fish count.
We took the 7:05AM ferry out of Long Beach and fished from about 8:30AM to 5:30PM and tool the 6:30PM ferry back.
When we first got there the bonito were running and a guy was reeling them in one after the other with a colt sniper style stick bait. He caught six in 10 minutes and told me he had caught about 50 since he had been fishing. Seemed like an over estimate to me but that's what he said and given that he was not stopping to keep fish or take pictures, it was definitely possible given the amount that we actually saw him catch. I quickly rigged up my sister with a colt sniper but I could tell by the pace of her retrieve and the length of her casts that it would be difficult for her to hook up. Her retrieve was too slow and casts were too short. The guy catching them was casting far and doing a quick retrieve that kept the lure near the surface. By the time I rigged up the rest of the poles, the bonito were gone and the three of us don't have high confidence fishing lures so we rigged up for bottom fishing.
Once I got the bottom rigs setup, all three of us started catching fish. My girlfriend caught the first fish and it was an impressive double up of a 14.5" sheephead and a garibaldi. We quickly returned the garibaldi and dispatched the sheephead. My forgetfulness almost compromised our trip. I had a box of 2 ounce bank sinkers that I forgot to pack so between the 3 of us we only had 9 sinkers. Fortunately, I walked to the Pleasure Pier in the harbor and found a tackle shop there that had the sinkers we needed. Bottom fishing the Mole with three of us being relatively inexperienced anglers meant that we were going to lose some tackle. This was a much more challenging day with kelp snags than our previous trip. All three of us lost fish that went into the kelp.
It was a tricky day for me cause I found it difficult finding my rhythm. I was spending so much time deckhanding (dehooking fish, unsnagging and retying rigs, and dispatching fish) that I felt like my line was not in the water very much. Just as I found a nice rhythm, it was time to start packing up. I'm trying to decide if stopping to clean fish is a good decision or if I should wait to clean fish when I get home. I'm leaning toward cleaning fish there. I'm just not setup well to clean fish at home and the fishing day is long enough that I don't mind taking 30 minutes of so to clean the fish. Also I can't imagine getting home at 8:30PM and taking another hour to clean fish (slower because of the poor setup). There is an unused boat ramp just to right of the Mole and you have easy access to sea water and when the tide comes up it will wash the scales off the ramp.
The bite was a level slower than the previous two trips but still excellent compared to anything available on shore anywhere else. The dominant species was again California Sheephead, followed very closely by Ocean White Fish. Every type of fish my sister caught was a new species for her (calico bass from shore, rock wrasse, senorita, blacksmith, blue perch, sheephead and ocean white fish). Those were the species that all three of us caught during the day. I'll update our total fish counts as soon as I have a chance to tally them.
Everytime we've been previously, we've shared the pier with groups of Korean anglers fishing very long light poles with floats for mainly opal eye. This is the first time we saw one of those groups have a noteable day of fishing. They seemed to with semi-regularity haul in very large opal eye that I estimate was were in the 14-16" range. They also were catching good amounts of blue perch and a few calico bass. My girlfriend and sister took turns fishing our own float rig but they again only caught black smith and blue perch.
The only nuance to our fishing that we noticed were that the ocean white fish did not start biting until late afternoon. Then we caught them as the dominant species until we left. The rising tide may have been a factor or they may be a species that bites closer to dusk. I remember this being the case last time to.
We ended up keeping 5 Sheephead, 8 Ocean White fish and 1 rock wrasse.
Great day! I think I will go back this Sunday on my own. I'll update the post later with more pictures and final fish count.
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